Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics www.atmos-chem-phys.net 1680-7316 1680-7324 9 22 2009 10.5194/acp-9-8785-2009 http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/9/8785/2009/ http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/9/8785/2009/acp-9-8785-2009.html http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/9/8785/2009/acp-9-8785-2009.pdf 8785 8797 2009-11-19 Regional N₂O fluxes in Amazonia derived from aircraft vertical profiles M. T. S. D'Amelio monicatais@yahoo.com L. V. Gatti J. B. Miller P. Tans Instituto de Pesquisas Energéticas e Nucleares (IPEN), São Paulo, Brazil National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Colorado, USA Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES), University of Colorado, Colorado, USA Nitrous oxide (N₂O) is the third most important anthropogenic greenhouse gas. Globally, the main sources of N₂O are nitrification and denitrification in soils. About two thirds of the soil emissions occur in the tropics and approximately 20% originate in wet rainforest ecosystems, like the Amazon forest. The work presented here involves aircraft vertical profiles of N₂O from the surface to 4 km over two sites in the Eastern and Central Amazon: Tapajós National Forest (SAN) and Cuieiras Biologic Reserve (MAN), and the estimation of N₂O fluxes for regions upwind of these sites. To our knowledge, these regional scale N₂O measurements in Amazonia are unique and represent a new approach to looking regional scale emissions. The fluxes upwind of MAN exhibited little seasonality, and the annual mean was 2.1±1.0 mg N₂O m^−2 day^−1, higher than that for fluxes upwind of SAN, which averaged 1.5±1.6 mg N₂O m^−2 day^−1. The higher rainfall around the MAN site could explain the higher N₂O emissions, as a result of increased soil moisture accelerating microbial nitrification and denitrification processes. 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